i don't think it is serious treatment yet. it is still superficial but religious literacy problem has not been resolved but we are doing more teaching about religion today. i was at a conference in new york of many groups interested in religious literacy including many foundations talking about how to improve it and we all agree it is a serious issue. if we are going to live with our differences we have to know more about one another. it is a religious freedom issue. if you don't teach young people about their neighbors we are not going to live well together in the future. in tolerance and hate is grounded in ignorance so we have got to do better. there's only one required religion in the united states in public school but i know about and i would note there is any more and that is in modesto, california and i helped them get that going after a conflict they had. they have done really well. all ninth graders take world religion for a semester and it has been fine.

the religious community supported in modesto but there are many world religions electives proliferating. fairfax county has the 11 and maryland has quite a few. not many districts have a lot of world religion elective and bible courses are proliferating. not all of them good but some quite good. the core curriculum with more national inclusion of teaching of religion is a tougher nut to crack because of all the issues of concern about teachers not being prepared to teach about religion. we have to address the core curriculum including more about how religions are part of society and the role of religion. we have got -- come along way in 20 years but we still have a lot of work to do. >> next question. the want to add to that? >> i do not think the

establishment clause was the cause of this. there is a religious literacy problem. the establishment cause and enforcement of it has -- it would be worse if it were not the case. that is the tougher question but americans, literacy in areas, a lot to do on the front. [talking over each other] >> i write a syndicated column called ethics and religion. same-sex marriage is inevitable in the united states. we had 32 states which have voted on it and every time it has been voted down. four state's voting this fall. we will see if there is a change but in every case where the ballot matters people who are voting vote it down and don't want same-sex marriage ended does impinge on religious freedom. in new hampshire a bed and breakfast run by catholic couple refused to allow a lesbian couple to have a wedding

reception at their facility. suggested other places they could go where there wasn't an objection by other bed-and-breakfasts but decided to sue and won their suit and they had to pay $30,000 in fines and foretold they had to open their facility to all marriages whether they liked it or not so they decided no more wedding receptions. they were fined and lost their source of major in come. i don't know how you can say this is not a religious freedom issue. >> it is an important religious freedom issue that will only advance as suggested. >> it is inevitable -- [talking over each other] >> that is a different point. whether it is inevitable or not, whether it is inevitable or not religious freedom has to be talked about in this battle and who wins or loses i am

suggesting, demographics suggest that i am right. inevitably when the younger generation comes along with a different view of this than current voters do it is going to change. spain has same-sex marriage. this is inevitable in our country but even if it isn't i don't disagree with what mike said, this is certainly a challenge to people now on their religious freedom grounds. the issue is how do we help protect as much as we can religious freedom without compromising the rights of people who should have the right to be treated with the same dignity and respect as other people? >> thanks very much for this panel. i am struck by how you are in the same book in terms of -- sports metaphors overcome me.

in terms of the principles of religious freedom and yet you can find yourself on the sides of the debate for things like that when it comes to the application. there's a sense that religious freedom is a continuous thing and people who agree on it can be adversaries went comes to the pastoral application of it. could you comment on that so we can understand that and get into the weeds, the religious right is -- the contraception mandate. what is going to happen in the court cases that are inevitably coming out of the mandate if it stands, if the obama administration doesn't change, the issues of the definition of religious institutions because there is also the so-called taco

bell issue of individual conscience of business owners. what is going to happen in the courts in your respective views? thanks very much. >> you have 30 cases involving 80 plaintiffs. in one sense if the issue doesn't go away for other reasons one short answer is the case ends up in front of the supreme court. you have been a proliferation of cases that variety in the outcomes that you end up with a split. the issue is sufficiently great importance that for one reason or another supreme court will take up one of those cases at some point. it won't be this coming term. it won't be the term after. and it will be determined for that. my prediction is part of the reason why i am enthusiastic. the plaintiffs are going to win on the merits when the merits

are reached. i think courts are more inclined to reach the statutory question first and not getting to additional questions -- the religious freedom restoration act. it was the law passed unanimously by congress signed by president clinton in 1993 to restore the scope of religious freedom protection that existed under the free exercise clause which we were railing against. withstand back in place, struck down by the states in 1997 but the federal government, mandated by federal law, we already had two early decisions from district courts involving private plaintiffs or for profit plaintiffs and the issue to address the merits, there were procedural issues because of

ongoing regulatory process that might create a sort of interim step in terms of going up and down the court but that actually is going to get resolved between now and august 1st, 2013. the administrative process will be done and the courts will invariably go straight and you will get merit decisions uniformly by the end of next year. >> those that depend on what the administration does and who wins? >> not really. what the administration has put into play is a piece of the problem. and also the constraints they put upon themselves in addressing that limited issue indicates that there is not going to be much if any relief in the offing for people who sued. basically reading of the writing on the wall or the federal register. there is some accommodation that

doesn't include relieving the burden and they go into court right away. >> we have four minutes left. let's move to another question. >> my prediction is the opposite. ultimately these regulations will be upheld. religious liberty is vitally important. we recognize -- the courts recognize, it is not absolute and it doesn't give you the right to harm others or impose your face on others. as anthony mentioned there are two sets of plaintiffs in those cases, those brought by religious institutions and those brought by for profit businesses and the religiously affiliated institutions are going to be addressed by the accommodation being referred to. and a question whether the

foundation goes far enough for them. the accommodation will be such that it will be attenuated. the other set of plaintiffs are for profits plaintiffs and there's a real danger -- a slippery slope if you allow for profit businesses to enter the stream of commerce to frame religious liberty rights to get out of a regulation they don't like. that will open the door to all sorts of exemptions for for profit business for labor laws and other anti-discrimination laws that courts will not be inclined to go that far. >> you talk a lot about religion in schools. i wonder if you have opinions on the new york city school warship which deals with off our and other religious groups meeting in those schools. >> i am against it. >> i am too and i can't understand it.

it is bizarre to me. it is bizarre to me that new york has done its heels in on giving access to facilities on the same basis to religious groups they do to other groups. not talking about religion, just keeps on going. i would have thought they would have given up on that. it is a very bad idea, the new york policy is a very bad idea. >> they have the constitutional authority to do what it did. there is room for joints where governments can act to avoid and cause problems. >> the health mandate covered mine so i will follow-up on this. there was no religious representation of the september 11th memorial service.

i will get into a point where we're so pluralistic religiously that the only way to accommodate everyone is no religion in the public square? >> i should hope not. i hope the response to the diversity is what the flowers bloom rather than spray roundup on them. >> i hope not and i don't think that is happening at all. we have to be careful not to conflate what the public square is with what the government is doing. religion is alive and well and religious expression is alive and well in the public square and it is appropriate for government to be careful not to -- >> i agree with that. one of the things we didn't mention which is the biggest free exercise challenge in the country today to religious freedom challenge not so much from government, the entire muslim activity.

i want to make sure that i promote a press conference the national press club at 9:30. some of you will be able to attend or follow this. what is the truth about american muslim questions and answers and it is supported by the interfaith alliance and also 20 some other groups, rabbis for human rights in north america and the law center and the united church of christ and the lot of folks to finally counter, and the demonization about islam in the united states. will raise a lot of issues. we have got to try in the name of religion freedom to stand up and say this is the more

accurate information about what you are getting not only about religious freedom for all people including american muslims but also some of the things that were characterized. >> thank you for being on this panel. [applause] >> this conference continues with the head of the merits public opinion polls. he dismissed allegations of mitt romney support for the democratic bias in recent polls. he presented free debate numbers in battleground states as well as public opinion polling on a range of issues.

>> please welcome andrew walter with tonight's of columbus. [applause] >> thank you very much. we have the code directors of the meredith institute for public opinion at marist college in poughkeepsie, new york. the institute was founded in 1978 and does research on elections and public policy issues. you probably know their work from the battleground folding they have been doing for nbc and wall street journal this election cycle and working with the knights of columbus since 2008 on a variety of moral and religious issue polling we have done over the years so we are pleased to have lee miringoff and barbara will be speaking about the election and the context of the moral and religious the issues that are under consideration. without further ado, lee

miringoff. [applause] >> thank you very much conlan and thank you from the religion news writers association convention for inviting us. welcome to the audience watching us at home, at work on c-span. we are halfway between the home of the baltimore orioles and the washington nationals. i give you greetings from new york, land of the 27 world championships. thank you very much. that was market tested in new york and did much better off we enough. that would be the strongest partisan comments i will make today. many of you know we are currently partnering with nbc news and the wall street journal

to told nine battleground states and national polls during the campaign. our partnership with knights of columbus bates to 2008 and during that time we conducted many surveys which tried to get beyond the labels and page-1 headlines. i would like to begin today with the ever changing overview of the presidential campaign which will hopefully set the context for barbara's discussion on our poll work on values. looking at the presidential election if there's one word to characterize this election it is polarization. as we look at the map of the country you are familiar with the divisions between red states and. states based on prior elections and current polling the map is divided into the blue which current calculations has roughly 237 e electoral votes. with obama's way and the

configuration points to a romney total of 191. more on that in a second. we have done several rounds of polls since the convention before this week's debate looking at the highly competitive nine states in partnership with polls with nbc news and the wall street journal. let me show you numerically where the recent polls and i emphasize free debate numbers are showing a obama is numerically ahead in each of the nine battleground states although in florida, virginia, north carolina, romney is well within striking distance of each of those. we will be revisiting florida, virginia and ohio to see what impact the debates may have had. these are states obama carried, all of which in 2008, close to

or above 50% and each of them as you look at the numbers to some degree reflecting his approval rating and a general improvement in the right direction, wrong direction numbers that have occurred the last several months. the president has enjoyed an unfavorable positive rating in each state. romney's likability score has been more mix. with the exception of virginia, north carolina and florida, his strongest three states, his likability has been upside-down. that may have changed but we will be in our next round of polls interested to see if the debate has reset the campaign in terms of these numbers. you have heard a lot of -- that was sold. pathways to the 270 alecto world votes and how president obama probably has more pathways to

that war easier ways of putting that together because it was built in the. state/read state differences but let me make a couple points on this. if you start with the. states and add florida which is 29 it is that 2 is 66 and would meet any of the other states to get 270. if you start again with the 237 and give romney ohio--give romney florida but obama of ohio, he is at 255 and obama would need two under states as long as one of them isn't new hampshire. only foury 40 votes. a comment on this. these states are pretty much all close. although the campaign's target one state against the other and

targeted to those states, if there is a universal shift they all could move three or four points and the electoral college could move in romney's direction dramatically or the president ends up reversing the current situation in this direction dramatically. we look at a state-by-state but there is that general universal thing which is why we're so interested in what the results will be when we go back in the field is coming -- and in terms of what a difference four years has made from the time barack obama -- candidates obama. four years ago he was the candidate of change and running against the war in iraq, running against in october and september october and economic collapse, he found a new way to appeal to

voters through social media and certainly energized and enthusiastically captured young voters. now as we turn to this campaign clearly he has -- i am sorry. a very different picture. emerges as the incumbent in the white house. clearly he can't be the change candidate. he is governing in difficult times, not only domestically but in terms of unexpected international events we have all witnessed in the last couple weeks. a prolonged and halting economic recovery. what we have seen in our polls, young voters -- he is getting a comparable share of the younger voters that he got four years

ago, it is a smaller slice of the pie which in poll talk is younger voters are falling out of the likely voter models so there are fewer of them all the obama is getting the overwhelming majority of them. factors in obama's favor most voters interested in these still blame george bush for economic problems and both camps understand this. obama says he inherited a mess. ronny acknowledges it was a problem but the recovery has been too slow. private campaign polls show the same thing. people feel the worst is behind us economically. a little uptick in optimism. romney free debate had a lot of convincing to do. likability was more in obama's favor. romney may have dictated a bit of the obama strategy such as it was during the debate and the

issue of campaign competence. both had so many unforced errors more so in their romney column than the obama column until denver this past week. in this highly polarized environment both campaigns have strategically been appealing to their respective political bases. what is unusual about this election cycle is most voters have picked sides early and lead to our polling right after the convention. looks like the final weekend of the campaign. they tell us they are firmly committed to their candidate and the number of undecided voters has been surprisingly very low. single digits. it is not about persuasion. it is about mobilization. both of the conventions were like that. in the next few weeks we will see a lot about mobilizing folks

to come out particularly because of early voting which has started in so many states. the middle is shrinking as far as these campaigns are concerned. we will talk about how there is still a middle to america. once you get beyond the campaign labels but clearly those are what drive strategy in campaigns and the electoral politics. if you look at the campaign ads, in new york we are not -- we don't get a lot of ads. i have seen one of you in virginia are seeing and if you are in any of the nine battleground states that is what you are seeing a lot of. mark murray? senior political editor of nbc news calls this a freeze of election and all these things, we picked a grab bag of the phrases that have permeated the

political landscape. but ironically in this hyperpartisan climate there is a consensus. i don't know if it is optimistic or pessimistic about the tone of this campaign. in surveys we have done with the night of columbus, americans have told us can they spend more time talking about the issues? the tone of the campaign is disrespectful, overwhelming majority of voters are frustrated by the tone of the campaign and we have seen this from july to a survey we completed. we went from 72% to 82% of voters telling us campaigns have become more negative. when we talk about general cost of democracy, july, 64% told us personal attacks harm the democracy. that has grown to 73%. even in the course of this

campaign we are seeing what was a very high number of people frustrated and upset by the tone of american politics has deteriorated in the last couple months. in discussing presidential elections, a member of the ap, and denied don't have any illusions that campaigns are always the place to talk about problems i do have the idea that campaigns are one of the places we sometimes talk about our problems. mike was speaking more than two decades ago about the 1988 bush/dukakis campaign. the quality of the presidential campaigns has deteriorated and in the closing four weeks of this campaign the fun has just begun. when we get beyond the labels and the freeze off campaigning we found in our research shared

few points that americans hold, values that unite people and i would like to turn the presentation to the director of the volt to look at that aspect and take a look at questions and hopefully some answers after barbara has finished. >> thank you. good afternoon. lee 11 and i are pleased to be here to talk about the campaign and some of the research we have done on values and what people think of particular issues and getting beyond the label. we talk about polarization and there is no question that this campaign is polarized and voters are polarized. we look at the question that is often asked and you heard a lot of shaft on social media and the news about party id and what we have seen is the electorate does

divide up pretty evenly. these numbers 48-40 to reflect registered voters as a whole. of weiner of the electorate to what we see as likely voters those numbers get even tighter. however, how do we come up with these numbers? if we take a look, we see on one side 25% consider themselves strong democrats. 20% consider themselves strong republicans at the extreme. why is that important? that is where the debate and arguments generally get defined. these are the people that are mobilized. when you drill down likely voters say in the full. these are people who are very active this a very interested in our likelihood to vote on collection day. that is the group that is focused on so we're looking at half of the electorate, the electorate that is likely to vote on election day but and the

middle we have another half of the electorate. swings and slides back and forth depending on the issues that come to the 4, depending on the candidates that are campaigning and in the race. is not surprising that when you talk to voters about the election they often tell us i am really deciding between two evils. i don't really feel like i fit on either side. and that is because even when we ask if they are democrats many of them tell us they're not strong democrats, they are weak democrats and similarly on the republican side. that we have this third which people talk about often. when we asked which way do you mean they tend to lean one way or the other but not necessarily, a fixed in time at any point. what is generally results in is

this disconnect and these numbers are overwhelming. 85% of voters actually think that decisionmakers do not see things the way the public does and this is the number that has grown over time. when we ask what should decisionmakers do should they compromise or should they stand on principle? we have a consensus. nearly three quarters of the 7-10 voters say we should have compromise to solve our problems. we have a quarter to think we should stand on principle and 7 in ten of that group we followed up and said how long should politicians stand on principle and we did give them choices. a couple months, until the next election and 7 in 10 said no, they should stand on principle

as long as it takes to get the type of policy that we want. when we think about what is going on in washington and people's perceptions they are thinking about that 17%, that 17% that is standing strong and not willing to compromise on a variety of issues. how does this translate? there is a consensus but it is a consensus which really suggests a crisis in confidence. we ask people, this is very similar to the right direction wrong direction issue or question that you see about the country as a whole but we ask in terms of value and moral compass to the country. what we find is this the number, the negative number, actually larger than when people think about the country as of hole and morally and in terms of value they don't feel things are moving in the right direction

and interestingly, it is across institutions, politicians are top of the negative list. you can see most of the institution that we think of people do not feel they are getting a lot of honesty and integrity and ethical perspective from these institutions including the federal government, entertainment, news media, business executives and if we added pollsters. we follow up by asking what about specifically the conduct of specific professionals. we see doctors at the top of the list, people trusting their doctors but the numbers fall off dramatically and it is very consistent and there is a very strong consensus that when you look to politicians, when you

look to public officials these are not people or leaders that the public feels they can have confidence in in terms of what they are saying or doing. interestingly, out when we look -- ask people about the ethical conduct of politicians if you look to the right hand side we ask about public policy and there's a consensus, 82% believe they don't act ethically or very honestly in most situations but on the left-hand side we also ask how do they conduct themselves in their personal lives? the public is very disappointed in what they see in terms of leadership. we talked a little bit about is it possible to be in business? is it possible to be in politics without having to compromise your ethics?

the public hands down thinks that in fact you can. you can be in business and don't have to be successful and don't need to compromise your ethics in order to do so. similarly in politics there's high expectation that in fact you can win, you can be successful in the political realm and not have to compromise your ethics. what this leads us to is a tension between what people see as their own value and expectations about how leaders should act in the public realm. we see very common american values and consensus for common values. success is born of individual effort, honesty and integrity, education. people think about teaching values to children and think

about treating others as you would want to be treated. they talk about faith in god and that is a very strong motivator. when we ask people where do you get your guidance? how do you direct your compass? they point specifically to family and religion and you can see the lower numbers in these institutions. we did a study, several studies which looked at generational attitudes. we asked people, if you think of yourself as 21 years old what were your life goals at that point? we asked those people who are under 30 specifically what are your life goals and this is interesting. when we looked at the millennial

generation, the top number was to be spiritual or close to god and family was second. we saw that god and family was actually the choice of nearly six in ten millennials and it provides an interesting perspective about that generation. when people look to the hope for our nation's future what do they tell us about? they looked at traditional values and that is the most important thing that will turn the country a round. if you look at the other end of the spectrum you see election 2012 and there are not a lot of people who selected that as a choice of something that was going to redirect our nation in the right direction so i would like to take a couple moments before we open up to questions to take a look at some supercharged issues some of which have been discussed in

this campaign and some of which have not. the first being abortion. if we take a look at this as a gallup poll and they have consistently asked the question over time. i am sure many of you have followed. ask a question about abortion, whether you are pro-life or pro-choice, one choice for the other. it is a black-and-white issue and you see how that has moved over time and actually since 2009 which was the first time for a life people considered more people consider themselves pro-life than pro-choice in the country but we have seen that that has gone back and forth over the last couple years. and considers themselves and identifies themselves as pro-life. let's take a deeper look at this particular issue. we asked this on a continuum.

as you can see, at each extreme, pro-life extreme we see abortion should never be permitted under any circumstances, pro-choice extremely see abortion should be available to a woman any time she wants one during her entire pregnancy. we do see again on each side. when we look at pro-life americans and pro-choice americans those who divided on the year earlier question, we see the plurality for pro-life americans is actually abortion should allowed in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother and for pro-choice americans the plurality is abortion should be allowed only during the first three months of pregnancy. you can see that you have more consensus on the issues and what

looks like the very divided nation on the issue itself. public opinion does talk about the fact that they feel that was in this country can protect both the woman and the unborn child. what we do see is when the issue becomes a health issue for women that is a strong, that is a strong argument but that is often polarized in the debate and as it is argued in campaigns and in the public sector. religious liberty. you have been talking a lot about that today as well. basically most people in this country believe in god, our spiritual and religion is very

important and people generally see that religious freedom is about being able to practice any religion and it is a very strong driver of public opinion. this is a very important factor. people even think an individual's freedom of religion should be protected even over government was and so this is something that is very strong, it is central to how people view the values that guided them. when we look specifically about issues that relate to religious liberty, there is a consensus to a majority who look to protecting the rights of individuals, not only in terms of abortion or employment or

marriage for same-sex couples but also protect the rights of those who may be in a position to have to follow laws that may disagree with their religious perspective and as you can see the public is open to the idea that doctors and health care professionals should be able to be able to follow their religious beliefs as well. immigration. we heard a lot about this earlier in the campaign, not so we we. it is thought of as of polarizing issue. but americans do think we can find compromise. we can have laws which protect our borders but also with respect immigrants. if you are talking deportation

and amnesty, those are polarizing discussions but when we look at taking the issue of immigration and we talk about illegal immigration and having some kind of compromise between having people live here but having some cost to staying here, that is something that has a consensus among americans and certainly characterizing immigrants. this is not to say the arguments can be exploited in different ways, but people understanding, their experience, with people who came to this country recently is also a positive one. this brings us back, when quoting be a pea. what we are looking at when we are looking at our data nationally is there are a wealth

of priorities that people don't feel like being addressed in the campaigns themselves. you can see the economy at the top. it is jobs, the federal debt and cutting government spending. people feel there's a good amount of waste and they think of having a smaller government to avoid that kind of waste. there are concerns of a future terror attack, health care, when we look specifically at how people manage if the recession, and three in 10 looking for work. since the time of the recession. those who don't think -- people have gaps on health insurance and the housing debacle, and mortgages are underwater. that is a sense of an overview

of research we have done. and polarization doesn't -- in another sense doesn't need to describe our body politics. thank you very much and if you have other questions we would be delighted to answer them. [applause] >> i don't know if this is done or not. you brought a lot of problems issues. there are a lot of issues being tracked and you have everything from conservative to liberal and republicans and race divisions and religious affiliation north and south and all these things.

based on the values based issues principally have you done any studies to see where a particular issue causes you to ignore or from another issue that might be a lower priority for example where the economy trump's a religious rights issue or vice versa? >> it is safe to say top of line for people in this particular election is the economy and jobs. people react to what is being offered by the campaign and by the candidates so when they are looking at the candidates and evaluating the candidates both presidential candidates -- lee 11 talked-about the fact that barack obama has a more positive favorable rating than mitt

romney, both of them are pretty divided when we look at people's impressions of both candidates they are divided about these candidates and part of that is that they don't see, they don't see everything they want to see in any one candidate so it is not surprising that the economy and jobs is at the top but people like thinking about these other values, and other issues as they are making their choice but having to make the choice between what they are being offered. >> there is a similar methodology the campaign pollsters use as the public pollsters' use. the goals are very different. we are trying to identify whether attitudes people might

share, campaign polls are about targeting and trying to influence public opinion because they want to win. sometimes the best strategic advice may be to drive of your opponent's negatives. they all do this. we see it in these ads which will push over $1 billion. a very different sort of dip -- the methods are the same but the goals are very different. >> you don't mobilize your base or get your supporters out to vote by talking about solutions to issues that provide compromise. strongest

supporters that are going how 82% of democrats said they supported compromise. 56% of republicans agreed and 72% of independents felt that

way. when we look at the 17%, although it had people from all parties, what was most interesting was the follow-up question which we provided to people, which was how long should this go on and you can see you end love with that core group, that 17% of the electorate who really want to fight for their positions on issues both democrat and republican, slightly more republican than democrat but from both parties, really want to stand on principle and not compromise. >> in that 17% between democrats and republicans it was about even? >> more republican than democrat. i don't know offhand but you can

extrapolate from the positive side so you have 82% of the democratic side and 56% agreeing with the other side somewhat. there are some people who felt they were in the middle but that gives you a sense of what that was. >> church of england newspaper. i wanted to follow up on the independent polls and campaign polls. dick morris had an e-mail blast where heath said don't believe the battle ground polls and listed two of your polls and his argument was that ohio for instance, last election, sampling was 10% of vantage, how do you respond to dick morris and? is he pushing polls? >> there is an answer but i don't think you want to take a course right now.

this is the argument you have been hearing about which is politely referred to as pollsters are setting party id and identification because it is so polarized and more democrats, moving the question. jim politely it is referred to as the pollster conspiracy. if you saw a bunch of pollsters trying to decide where they wanted to go for lunch you would soon realize they couldn't do anything but that is a different matter. pollsters don't search party id. >> public polls because there are some polls -- >> good polls are not setting party id because it itself varies from election to election. people say they will vote more democrat or republican. it varies in a particular poll that dick morris was referring to. we had 2% more in ohio democratic but at the same time we asked 1% more republican and

1% more in florida. he picked that one to take a pot shots at. more recent poll had more republicans than in 2008. the long and short is there is no standard party id. comparison to 2008 is itself a comparison to the exit polls and party id does vary from election to election. if you use 2004 you would be surprised to find more democratic, we are finding it a little less democratic than in 2008. we had a group over the weekend last weekend -- and a lot of questions about jobs and the economy and values in society and one person asked about this

party id controversy that exists and this is sort of a very -- not quite in the beltway but more predominant. >> it is an argument that both sides make depending upon who doesn't like the result of the polls. we did see democrats make a similar arguments in 2004. what lee is talking about for those who may not know the difference between party identification which is an attitude question, what do you consider yourself to be? i showed you the numbers i had, i should you it was 48 democrats and 42 republican but in 2010 that was more republican than democrat and it is how people look at themselves. we have party registration often confused with that. registration has to do with if you are in a state where you can enroll in a particular party

which you can't do in every state then you would register in a particular party kind of like when we ask how old you are in a survey or actually ask in which year are you born because people don't like to tell us their age. >> everyone is proud of the year they were born. >> we have a computer program to figure it out. it is like asking your age so that is an objective measure as is registration. to you consider yourself to the young, middle-aged or older? that is an attitude and has a lot to do with what you were doing today or the day before in how you feel about that. there are very different measures. when pollsters balance their survey so they take numbers and they balance the data and model of the data what we are doing is

taking our sample and looking at other measures and real numbers so we look at the census, the 2010 census and distribution of age and in, and gender and region and population around the country and those are real numbers that we can now compare our sample to. >> but not party id. >> there is no national measure to balance party identification first because it is an attitude and even if we want to balance for registration, not every state allows people or asks people to enroll. >> the irony would be if romney does pick up his numbers in the next round the conspirators will now be being accused the this the obama people as opposed to the romney people. it goes with the turf. >> do you have any sense of how white evangelical likely voters

are breaking votes in battleground states and nationally? >> take the harder question. >> it is very clear for mitt romney. quite a wide margin. if i recall the last numbers, his support was in the mid 60s. i don't think it is -- the rest is not necessarily support for barack obama. it divides between support for barack obama and undecided. >> back to the issue of mobilization, the key is going to be as we get into the final two weeks, whose folks show up and the group that is the biggest group to look at right now are the 18 to 29-year-olds because as we look at the likely voter models they are not there and the numbers in terms of turn out as they were four years ago so expect president obama to visit a lot of college campuses.

>> that was his margin last time. [in animal] -- >> i was here. two quick questions. the lot of numbers flying around. is this on your web site? f we go there we can find the presentation. >> if you go to the knights of columbus -- >> reasonable presentation. >> that would be great. you talk about where people have hope and traditional values and did you define traditional values? did you pull them together to say how did you get traditional values? >> we provided it as a choice. traditional values was a choice. >> took my question.

>> that was large. did you draw it any farther to get an idea? >> in the numbers, the knights of columbus site, we generally provide all the tables so that you can look at each of these questions by different segments of the population and different demographic groups but i don't recall offhand how that broke down in terms of political party or age or other factors i am sure you are interested in. if you are interested in that, i would be happy to provide it for you. >> all the surveys we believe strongly in transparency. everybody says that in campaigns that go to our web site. everything is there, more than you would never want to know and you can be open to -- not quite looking right. >> thank you very much. [applause]